With regard to the first point, that conditional scholarships are a way to keep the high-grade students who'd otherwise be likely to transfer to higher-ranked schools, I don't think the fear of looking "crass" should prevent schools from being clearer that this is part of their interest. That is, the schools could be much more honest that the scholarship for the second and third years will be earned only by students who perform so well during their first year that they would be eligible to transfer to higher-ranked schools. Statistics on the percentage of first-year scholarship students who obtain second- and third-year scholarships would make the point nicely. While there may be no factual difference, there's a definite perceptual difference between "I have a scholarship for three years so long as I keep my grades up" and "I have a scholarship for *one* year and can earn a scholarship for the other two if I'm among the top third of my class."

The law school world has been abuzz since an article in the Sunday NY Times, two weeks ago, exposed the practice of recruiting new law students with financial aid, but conditioning the continuation of scholarships on good grades. Students were said to overestimate their chances of obtaining thes...